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I’m trying my hand at popping corn on the stove. One of my favorite things to eat is popcorn. However, I do not own an air popper, microwave popcorn bowl or a special popcorn pot so I haven’t made it at home. I’ve read the tutorials on making it in a paper bag in the microwave, I’ve tried Jiffy Pop, and I don’t care for microwave popcorn, so for years I’ve been trying various brands, all of which I would recommend:

Love everything about it but the gross fingers it gives you.

Every kind of Indiana Popcorn is really good

Good Health Organic Popcorn tastes the closest to home made.

But any of these bags costs $2.99 or more and offers a couple servings while a bag of kernels cost $1.40 and seems like unlimited servings. Since I’m cheap I keep wanting to find a way to make it at home without buying a special thing to make it in/ not ruin any of my pots with burned kernels.

I frequent the blog Simply Recipes and have never tried a recipe off there I didn’t love. So, when I saw they had a popcorn method that appeared really easy I decided to be brave and give it a try:

Ingredients

Method

1 Heat the oil in a 3-quart saucepan on medium high heat.

2 Put 3 or 4 popcorn kernels into the oil and cover the pan.

3 When the kernels pop, add the rest of the 1/3 cup of popcorn kernels in an even layer. Cover, remove from heat and count 30 seconds. (Count out loud; it’s fun to do with kids.) This method first heats the oil to the right temperature, then waiting 30 seconds brings all of the other kernels to a near-popping temperature so that when they are put back on the heat, they all pop at about the same time.

4 Return the pan to the heat. The popcorn should begin popping soon, and all at once. Once the popping starts in earnest, gently shake the pan by moving it back and forth over the burner. Try to keep the lid slightly ajar to let the steam from the popcorn release (the popcorn will be drier and crisper). Once the popping slows to several seconds between pops, remove the pan from the heat, remove the lid, and dump the popcorn immediately into a wide bowl.

With this technique, nearly all of the kernels pop (I counted 4 unpopped kernels in my last batch), and nothing burns.

5 If you are adding butter, you can easily melt it by placing the butter in the now empty, but hot pan.

6 Salt to taste.

Additional tips:From the comments section

a If you add salt to the oil in the pan before popping, when the popcorn pops, the salt will be well distributed throughout the popcorn.

Yield: Makes 2 quarts, a nice amount for two people, or for one hungry one.

I did it.

I had sunflower oil so I used that but other then the oil I followed this exactly and ended up with only 5 un-popped kernels, and nothing burned. I tried the tip suggesting adding salt to the oil and that worked fairly well. If you love you some popcorn and don’t have a fancy pants making method try this recipe. It’s pretty good.